


Be Your Name Buxbaum Or Bixby Or Bray

by popfly



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Congratulations, Graduation, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-28
Updated: 2012-08-28
Packaged: 2017-11-13 02:42:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/498550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/popfly/pseuds/popfly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Out there things can happen<br/>and frequently do<br/>to people as brainy<br/>and footsy as you.</p><p>And when things start to happen,<br/>don’t worry.  Don’t stew.<br/>Just go right along.<br/>You’ll start happening too."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Be Your Name Buxbaum Or Bixby Or Bray

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Dr. Seuss for the ubiquitous "Oh, The Places You'll Go!". Written for the "congratulations" square on my Cotton Candy Bingo card.

Stiles hadn’t ever imagined what his high school graduation day would be like. Being in near constant danger did a real number on the amount of daydreaming one did about one’s future. He had hoped he’d get the chance to graduate high school because it would be such a waste of time to sit through all those classes and do all that homework just to be violently murdered before it paid off.

He hadn’t ever pictured the day, but if he had, the reality of it still would’ve blown the daydream out of the water.

The day doesn’t start off that great. Stiles hits the snooze button on his alarm so many times his dad wakes him up by pounding on the door, startling Stiles so bad he falls out of bed and bangs his wrist on the end table. He takes a superfast shower and scarfs down two bowls of cereal, then ends up spilling blue milk on his white dress shirt when he tips the bowl up to drink from it.

He runs up to his room and flings his shirt at his hamper, gets a brilliant idea and calls Scott.

“Dude, let’s go naked under our robes today.”

Scott sighs on the other end of the phone. “They’re gowns, not robes, and no.”

“I prefer a wizard reference to an evening wear reference, and yes. It’ll be awesome.”

“Well I prefer not flashing my junk to all of Beacon Hills if I can help it, so I’m going to pass.”

Stiles is setting up for some epic persuasion, sucking in enough breath to make “come on” at least sixteen syllables long but Scott cuts him off.

“Dude, Derek’s going to be there. Do you really want to be running around with just a flimsy ass _gown_ on in front of Derek?”

Stiles snaps his mouth shut. Derek’s naked body has featured in a lot (okay most, okay all) of Stiles’s jerk off fantasies, but Stiles’s naked body is nothing to fantasize about. He pictures his chicken legs sticking out of a graduation robe and starts rummaging for another dress shirt.

“Okay, fully clothed it is. Good call. See you there?”

Scott is laughing as Stiles hangs up on him.

*****

Stiles can pick Lydia’s hair out of any crowd, and the bright sun helps, making it glow like fire in the midst of all the duller browns and blondes. He gave up on his crush junior year (about the same time he started fantasizing about Derek, coincidentally) but he thinks he’ll always feel a flutter in his stomach when he looks at her. Old habits, all that.

She’s with her family on the edges of a fairly large group of people that would alarm Stiles just by being near each other on any day other than today. Stiles can see Allison’s dad and Scott’s mom talking, Boyd and Isaac looking tense nearby while Erica fans herself with her mortarboard. The Martins and the Whittemores look out of place in their dark suits and expensive sundresses, but not nearly as out of place as Derek looks, like his olive-green button down is choking him.

It might actually be choking Stiles, because the way it stretches across Derek’s chest is making Stiles feel a little breathless.

He focuses on the fact that his dad is standing right next to him, and motions in the direction of the group, heading over.

Scott sees them coming and breaks away from Allison (Stiles always imagines the sound of Velcro in his head and grins to himself), loping over to give Stiles and his dad each a hug.

“Can you believe we’re finally out of here?” Scott asks, grinning.

“I actually cannot,” Stiles says, grinning back.

There are a lot of back slaps and handshakes and hugs when they join the group, and Stiles can’t stop smiling. He knows the ceremony is going to be long and boring, but it’s worth it for the pride on his dad’s face and the knowledge that after today he doesn’t ever need to come back to Beacon Hills High School again.

The ceremony is long and boring, with a few bright spots. Lydia’s valedictorian speech is inspirational (if a little cutting, and Stiles thinks that’s the best part), Jackson’s cap gets blown off his head by a gust of wind while he’s crossing the stage and he has to chase it down, red-faced. Stiles doesn’t trip going up the steps, holds out the correct hand for his diploma, and shakes the principal’s hand without flailing too much. And he’s pretty sure that when they call his real name out more people cheer for him than laugh at him.

He catches his dad’s eyes as he’s filing back down his row, and Stiles thinks they might be a little wet. Which of course makes Stiles’s eyes a little wet. As a result he’s sniffling and probably blotchy in the face when he looks at the person sitting next to his dad and it’s Derek. Who is actually almost smiling. And looking at Stiles.

Stiles bangs his knee on a chair.

*****

They all throw their caps in the air like some teen movie cliche, but Stiles is too caught up whooping and thumping people on the back to care. The crowd becomes a living thing, people shifting and elbowing to get to their families, and Stiles joins in, bouncing on the balls of his feet to try to spot his dad.

“Congratulations, Stiles.” He feels the words against his ear more than he hears them in all the ruckus, and stops in his tracks, feeling someone very solid bumping into his back. It’s Derek, he can smell the leather scent that seems to cling to him even when he’s not wearing his jacket, and he’s smirking when Stiles spins around.

“Thanks,” Stiles says, rubbing a hand over his head. “Why were you sitting with my dad?” He isn’t trying to sound accusatory, really, but it was kind of weird.

Derek just shrugs, but Stiles can tell when he’s amused and now is one of those times. He apparently thinks that’s an appropriate answer because he doesn’t offer a different one and Stiles rolls his eyes.

“I got you a present."

Stiles has no idea what to say to that. A present? Derek hadn’t even bought him a present on his eighteenth birthday, and no, letting the pack party in his creepy underground lair (and also providing the booze, though he refuses to admit that it was him, like there were rum fairies or something) did not count. Stiles is so taken aback that he can’t even think of anything to say, and usually that isn’t an issue because his mouth doesn’t need much prompting to just go off on its own, but right now it’s just sort of gaping uselessly open.

Derek looks even more amused. He doesn’t have a box or a bag or anything in his hands, other than a rolled up program, and he doesn’t say anything else about any presents before shouldering past Stiles and losing himself in the crowd. Stiles shakes his head a few times and then closes his mouth with a click of teeth, moving through the crowd again in search of his dad.

*****

They go out to dinner, the Stilinskis, McCalls, and Argents, and at first Stiles is a little wary but it ends up being kind of nice. They eat at the Japanese place where the chefs flip things into their hats, and their guy almost gets tackled when he squeezes a fake bottle of soy sauce at Mr. Argent, saved only by Allison’s lightning quick arm across her dad’s chest.

Stiles is feeling full and happy and definitely is not wondering about Derek’s present when his dad slides an envelope and a gift across the table.

Stiles’s eyebrows go up and his dad returns the look. “The top card is from me. The other stuff is from Derek.”

Stiles feels his face flush, and his hands are clumsy as he opens his dad’s card. Several twenty dollar bills flutter down into his lap, and he gathers them back up and stuffs them back in the envelope, muttering. He had told his dad not to get him anything, but he had a feeling he wouldn’t listen. Stiles skims the card, some poem about growing up followed by his dad’s scrawled signature, and leans forward for a one-armed hug. “Thanks, Dad.”

He tries not to pull back too quickly, or look too eager as he tears the plain red wrapping paper off of Derek’s present.

It’s a book.

Not just any book.

It is “Oh, The Places You’ll Go!” By Dr. Seuss.

“Huh,” Stiles’s dad says. “That’s a … nice present.”

Stiles can feel laughter bubbling, and he worries it’ll come up too hysterical for his dad’s comfort, so he tamps it down. “It is,” is all he says.

He remembers the conversation. It was two weeks before graduation and they’d all been at Derek’s for movie night, a tradition that Stiles had started junior year and that the girls (or at least Allison and Lydia) had kept going strong. Lydia had been freaking out about her speech (as much as she ever freaked out, which was more her bitching about it than anything else) and Stiles had joked about just using “Oh, The Places You’ll Go!”, earning him one of Lydia’s patented glares. He’d taken to quoting it whenever he was around her, and had received a number of bruises because of it.

It wasn’t even one of Stiles’s best jokes, but apparently it stuck with Derek. And as far as gag gifts went, it was pretty great, really. Especially when Stiles opens the cover and sees the spiky writing on the title page. “This is actually pretty accurate for you, Stiles.” No signature.

Stiles needs to go right now.

*****

There’s a party at Lydia’s, of course, but Stiles knows Derek won’t be there. No, he’ll be lurking around in the neighborhood like he does whenever the pack is out together, because apparently a big part of the alpha’s job description is lurking.

Stiles finds his car parked two blocks down, and when Stiles knocks on the window Derek’s eyebrows draw so far together they almost become one.

Derek gets out and leans back against the car, his dress shirt untucked and his leather jacket back on. Stiles wants to climb him like a tree.

“That was actually a really adorable gift,” Stiles says, feeling the smile spread across his face in a way he can’t quite control.

“Adorable?”

“Yes, Derek, adorable. You actually have the capacity to do adorable things, who would’ve thought. It was funny, and sweet, and adorable, and you’re just going to have to live with that. And if you don’t kiss me in the next three seconds I might say something even more insulting - “

Derek kisses him.


End file.
